An Unlikely Marriage: Technology, Biology, and Politics

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This is an election that you can actually vote in… if you take chemistry. Mrs. Gibson is introducing a new type of biology project that’s end results depend solely on the votes of chem kids, turning the tide on what biology projects are and what they’ve always been.

One of Mrs. Gibson’s students, Michelle Hwang, gives a rundown of the project: “The original controller of the cell, the nucleus, has retired. So, in order to elect a new cell executive, each group of around six to seven people is assigned a new cell organelle. We become its campaign team and are supposed to get the organelle elected.”

Some posters students have made and hung up outside of a chemistry class

In other words, the groups run against each other in an all-out campaigning war.

Students must research their organelle, design posters incorporating original online artwork, and make promotional videos. They even develop a whole “website” dedicated to the advocacy of their organelles using Google Sites.

Possibly one of the students’ favorite parts is “mudslinging”. This is where, Hwang says, “We throw shade at our opponents” by claiming negative effects or characteristics of the other organelles to make themselves more likely to win the election.

They can also partake in extra credit options such as creating their own stickers and shirts and using social media to boost their campaign.

Miraculously, the project manages to connect something that holds such a tremendous amount of relevancy and significance in people’s everyday lives to a school subject that most people forget about past the classroom.

“All of the technology the students are using supports the development of campaign materials which mirrors something that a real political candidate would need,” states Mrs. Oliver, the instructional technology integrator here at NAI.